WATCH: Song of the Whale's "The Night Whale" research mission with NOAA

In this three part series, we follow the International Fund for Animal Welfare's purpose built research vessel, the Song Of The Whale, to Stellwagen Bank off the coast of Massachusetts.

There, she and her crew join a team from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration known as NOAA to undertake a first of its kind project to collect a full 24 hours of data from tagged humpback whales.

The mission is to gather that data, analyse it and learn what these magnificent creatures, especially mother/calf pairs, do at night below the surface.